Taking into account taste, cost per ounce, ABV and age sensitivity (if seasonal) what beer in your area gives you the best bang for your buck?

My vote goes to Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout, delicious, 10%abv, good availability when in season, highly cellarable so you can stock up, and it cost $7.49 a four pack in my area (~.16c per oz)

Your vote? (when you respond please put price, size of pack/bottle)

*I understand many will think ABV shouldn't matter, but there are some of us that enjoy the buzz that comes associated with drinking beer so ABV would be considered in a purchase

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I would have to agree. Great price for a very solid beer. Also, left over Brooklyn Monster B-Wine is around 7 bucks per 4 pack at my local store. And yes, by bang I figured you may have meant buzz! Cheers!

Great Divide's new Big Show mixed twelve pack. Three Hercules imperial ipa, three Yeti imperial stout, three hades belgian strong pale ale, and three Hibernation old ale, all for $21.95. The Hercules and Yeti four packs are normally $13.01 and the others are $10 a sixer. Unbelievable value and beer. Thanks Great Divide, I love you.

Im with ya on Brooklyn BCS, hard to beat that for the price. Lagunitas has beers like Brown Shugga and Undercover Investigation Shut Down Ale that are close to 10% abv and about $10/sixer. Founders Dirty Bastard for about 10/sixer is pretty solid as well. And then theres always Trader Joe's Stockyard Oatmeal stout, man thats tasty for $1/bottle.

These prices people are quoting are amazing. Indiana blows for beer prices. They grease you up and aim for penetration in Indy. Want to pay 11.99 for a 4 pack of pale or 10.99 for a four pack of cream ale? We've got it.

Some of these surprised me but sometimes the beer's score is just so much higher than the style average that almost any price makes it a great deal on this measure.

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Yeah pretty much all of these surprise me. Parabola a better deal than Old Rasputin or Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout? Central Waters BBB a better deal than Sierra Nevada Bigfoot? Saison Brett a better deal than Hennepin, Sofie, and Colette? Hopslam a better deal than Lagunitas Sucks or New Belgium Rampant?

I mean, I know you are taking into account the ratings, but Hopslam costs twice as much as Sucks and Rampant yet doesn't score twice as high, Parabola costs almost twice as much as Rasputin and Brooklyn BCS but doesn't score nearly twice as high, Saison Brett is twice as much as Sofie and more than twice as much as Hennepin and Colette, etc......

Yeah pretty much all of these surprise me. Parabola a better deal than Old Rasputin or Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout? Central Waters BBB a better deal than Sierra Nevada Bigfoot? Saison Brett a better deal than Hennepin, Sofie, and Colette? Hopslam a better deal than Lagunitas Sucks or New Belgium Rampant?

I mean, I know you are taking into account the ratings, but Hopslam costs twice as much as Sucks and Rampant yet doesn't score twice as high, Parabola costs almost twice as much as Rasputin and Brooklyn BCS but doesn't score nearly twice as high, Saison Brett is twice as much as Sofie and more than twice as much as Hennepin and Colette, etc......

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Rampant isn't considered a bargain....
It's pretty much garbage in my eyes, ABV be dammed.

$20 is standard Midwest pricing, I've seen it for $25 out east and passed. If it was as low as $14.99 anywhere I can't imagine it ever getting to the shelf, stores would have to keep it in the backroom for people to ask for it.

Hands down Torpedo. In my area it's $8.99 which is extremely cheap for a DIPA. Moreover, the beer kicks ass and, in my opinion, gets overlooked in the DIPA conversations because it is so easil accesible.

Schlafly 12 packs (Dry Hopped APA is one of my go-to beers) are often $11.99 a 12 pack at our local grocery store. They also have 12 packs of their Heffeweizen (actually an American Wheat), Pale Ale, and a mixed 12 that has Pale Ale, Heffe, and Dry Hopped APA.

$20 is standard Midwest pricing, I've seen it for $25 out east and passed. If it was as low as $14.99 anywhere I can't imagine it ever getting to the shelf, stores would have to keep it in the backroom for people to ask for it.

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You say that yet your based in Saskatchewan ....
My referencing is from Hoplsam forum pricing questions, and what people posted in Hopslam forums. I believe you are getting a bit of gouge at $25. Others would agree.

You say that yet your based in Saskatchewan ....
My referencing is from Hoplsam forum pricing questions, and what people posted in Hopslam forums. I believe you are getting a bit of gouge at $25. Others would agree.

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I'm not actually in Canada.

Unless we're talking Michigan I just can't figure out where people would be getting it that low. The obvious places in Iowa and Illinois always seemed to have it for around $20, and in Illinois' case the obvious places are usually the cheapest. $25 is indeed a bit much but we're talking D.C. here when I say east coast, never been anywhere else on the coast during Hopslam season. D.C. prices tend to vary a lot. I've seen Allagash White four-packs as low as $10 but as high as $16......

Yeah pretty much all of these surprise me. Parabola a better deal than Old Rasputin or Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout? Central Waters BBB a better deal than Sierra Nevada Bigfoot? Saison Brett a better deal than Hennepin, Sofie, and Colette? Hopslam a better deal than Lagunitas Sucks or New Belgium Rampant?

I mean, I know you are taking into account the ratings, but Hopslam costs twice as much as Sucks and Rampant yet doesn't score twice as high, Parabola costs almost twice as much as Rasputin and Brooklyn BCS but doesn't score nearly twice as high, Saison Brett is twice as much as Sofie and more than twice as much as Hennepin and Colette, etc......

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Oh I feel you. The method definitely doesn't pass the face validity test at all. Here's the breakdown on how these things were pooped out.

We'll take Parabola as the highest scoring RIS. Generally I can expect to get a bomber of that for around $16. At 22 ounces, it's somewhere close to 2 beers in the container for something near $8 per "beer." It scores at 100 (+11 from style median). For comparison, Old Rasputin is a 4 pack I can get for around $9 (about $2.25 per) and it scores at 96 (+7). In isolation, this still doesn't look like a great tradeoff. Like 6 bucks more per beer and a 4 point boost in BA score.

The thing that makes Parabola come up with a higher score is the distribution of other beers that were entered into the regression. Of the 26 locally available RIS's that I tossed into the equation, Parabola had the highest score by 3 points (several 97s on the list but no others that are higher). The lowest on the list was a 90 (nothing below-median was included). Meanwhile, prices ranged from $2/per to $12.50/per. So what's happening is that Parabola has a 3 point advantage over every other beer on the list (on a 10 point scale) while an $8/per price tag is sort of high-middle of the pack. When you run a regression, Parabola's residual is the highest positive-end score of the bunch.

This is pretty much the same reason Zombie Dust scores the highest – at a score of 100 in a style where the median beer is an 83 (i.e., +17), it would take a HELL of a high price tag not to be considered a hugely “good deal” on this metric.

Obvious problems abound here:
- Changes in price per beer are extremely apparent to the customer, whereas changes in BA score are much less so (as well as much more subjective). While a 3 advantage for Parabola is significant on the scale selected, it’s likely near irrelevant on a wider scale.
- Beers selected are limited to Illinois bottle distribution only, which limits the sample size and applicability of the results. And without something like a master list of beer prices (if anyone is sitting on a craft beer MSRP database, hit me up) non-local beers would be sort of hard to price anyway.
- Beers selected are above-median for style only, which really inflates the impact of BA score because about half of the beers in a style aren’t being considered (meanwhile the price-per-beer range is probably pretty representative as-is).

So I suppose I should have mentioned even more directly that one should take my estimates with a very large grain of salt. I mostly use it to get a very rough at-a-glance estimate of price/quality. Especially when a beer is on the opposite end of the spectrum (expensive given its score). Given enough time, though, I hope to develop even better estimates.

I have absolutely no idea where you people can find 12 packs of craft beer for anything less than $15. Hell, Sam Adams 12 packs are like $20 where I live now.

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The fine state of Massachusetts. One of the Best beer states in the country. And why is it so hard to get Lot 40, Pike Creek, or some of the fine Canadian whisky here. Keeping it for your 9 months of winter and 3 months of poor skiing.